“What makes the unbearable bearable is each other.” Writer and palliative care doctor Rachel Clarke used that phrase to describe what she learnt from one family’s decision to give the heart of their daughter, killed in a motor accident, to another child who was dying of organ failure. The Story of a Heart is a tale of altruism and love from everybody involved, and it shines like a beacon in our cruel and ugly world.
Despite all the evidence to the contrary, I believe that people want to do good. Volunteers everywhere are beavering away to improve the environment, comfort the weak, support the needy. As friends, neighbours and family we are there to help each other.
But what happens to those without any “each other”? Some people can go an entire day without speaking to another person. There is always a queue, next to the supermarket self-checkout machines, for the solitary human cashier. I suspect some people are lining up just for the opportunity to chat to someone for a few minutes. Sadly, it looks likely those human checkouts are going to disappear completely.
I sometimes feel lonely, although I am blessed with friends and family. They are all a great comfort, but eventually they go home. I am left with the gaping loss of the person who has left forever, with whom I could be totally honest and myself, warts and all. Who is there now to wipe my tears and make me laugh? I still talk out loud to my long-departed husband, especially when I watch the news on Channel 4, but our imagined rant about politicians and human idiocy has grown fainter over the years.
Loneliness is terribly difficult to deal with. One can wake up and feel overwhelmed by depression at the thought of a solitary day ahead. The easiest thing is to turn over and stay in bed, but an effort must be made when one least feels like it, to get up and be active, or one descends even deeper into the Slough of Despond.
My sister Billie, who ended her days in France, spoke little French despite living there for many years. She would sally forth every day with her bright blue hair coiffed and jewellery flashing, and would sit in cafés accosting customers hoping for a quiet coffee with a barrage of shouted franglais. “How êtes-vous? Moi Billie,” she would say, pointing at herself. “Vous?” (Poking the stranger.)
It always embarrassed me, but her funeral was full of affectionate strangers.
Some people’s “each other” is an animal. On the whole, they are easier to love and be loved by than a person. But I haven’t been a dog person since lockdown, when the whole world appeared to buy a mutt for company, so that they now seem to outnumber the humans. Will some later generation look back in amazement at the fact that some strange four-legged animals used the streets as lavatories? (And, yes, I know the owners are meant to pick it up—but not the urine.) I was tempted to buy a more houseproud cat, but there is a danger it could outlive me. Anyway, no snooty puss would sit up and beg for food or make other cute efforts to render my life bearable. So, cats are not the ideal “each other”. More “everyone for himself”.
I recently attended a wonderful service in one of London’s oldest churches, St Bartholomew-the-Great in Smithfield. It was a complicated high church mass, as practised there for hundreds of years. I was struck that the congregation was mainly people on their own. The worship was devout, with lots of incense and physical and vocal activity by the priests, but the congregation seemed lonely and introspective. I was saddened by this, until the priest merrily announced that the ritual was to be followed by a film and pizzas in the crypt. The unbearable was left behind for the Almighty to deal with, and everyone flocked to party with “each other”.
We desperately need to communicate with others in this frightening world. In Gaza, Israel’s awful cruelty and uncontrolled slaughter of Palestinians seems to go on unchecked. Why is the world not shouting in horror?
I have to believe that good is lurking, waiting for an opportunity to prevail. Remarkable tales of organ donation, like the one told by Rachel Clarke, are brilliant examples. They are stories of miraculous, unconditional love.
I am deeply grateful for the joy and comfort to be found in each wonderful “other” that I am blessed to have in my life.
